


Knowledges

by imperfectkreis



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: First Time, Hand Jobs, Kissing, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-07-19
Packaged: 2019-06-12 18:47:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15346227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imperfectkreis/pseuds/imperfectkreis
Summary: His skin smells of brine, slightly gritty to the touch. As if the open air doesn’t agree with his complexion. He’ll dry out, stranded on the shore.





	Knowledges

His skin smells of brine, slightly gritty to the touch. As if the open air doesn’t agree with his complexion. He’ll dry out, stranded on the shore.

Corvo tells him as much, that he’s not sure that he was built for this century, touching each cheek, feeling the fat underneath depress under this thumbs, spring back up as he lets go, watching it plump when the pressure is removed.

He smiles back at Corvo, admitting, “Maybe so,” with a voice that is ever so slightly different than the one that reverberated across the Void. His lips and teeth and tongue make different sounds, a dead accent, clinging around his vowels, strange and unplaceable, lost to time.

And yet, somehow, he stands in Corvo’s chambers.

He pulls away from Corvo’s tactile affections, and instead flits about the room, touching everything he can lay his fingers on. The glass of whiskey left unfinished, a fountain pen, the figs brought up from the kitchen earlier this afternoon, just on the verge of overripe. He picks up one of them, squeezing slightly, as Corvo had done to his cheeks, watching the skin bend. He brings the fruit up to his nose, breathing in the sweet scent.

“My mouth always tastes of blood,” he says, still contemplating the morsel in his hand. “I think it always will.”

Corvo has no better idea but, “try the fruit.”

He frowns, putting it back down on the platter, “I’ll only ruin your meal.”

Corvo laughs, a warm, full sound he does not expect from himself, “you couldn’t possibly.”

“Liar,” he smiles, running his finger along the delicate engraving that circles the edge of the dish. Coiling vines cut through the silver. “‘Spymaster’ was never suited for your talents.”

“Oh?” Corvo asks, taking a moment to sit behind his desk. No need to stay on his feet if not-a-god wishes to speak. He is nothing, if not verbose. Corvo has already played audience to enough of his cleverly spoken scenes in the Void, and has no reason to believe that this aspect of the man has changed.

“You are beautifully skilled, but value honesty too much. Choosing to say nothing, rather than opt for flattery. A Spymaster must listen to the whispers between the walls. But he must too know when to add his voice. To shape the narratives that grip an empire.” He smiles, sitting on the empty corner of Corvo’s desk, crossing his ankles and letting the backs of his shoes settle against the wood. He is long-legged with thin wrists, poking out from under his cuffs as he gestures. He speaks excitedly with his hands, tension mounting with each observation on how Corvo might be lacking. “Oh, the stories you could craft, Corvo. But no, you love the truth.”

“Ah, you know me so well,” Corvo teases, reaching around to grab his forgotten drink from behind his conversation partner’s back. He allows himself the accident of brushing his knuckles against the fabric of his coat, just at his tailbone. If he notices, he says nothing.

“I know all my Marked,” he smiles, pale eyes still so hauntingly unfamiliar. Strange to consider that they might be even odder than the black muck that kept him blinded for centuries. “Though, I suppose, this is the end. Or rather, the end has come already. And this is the space after the end,” he laughs. “I never saw, never saw…”

Reaching out, Corvo bushes his fingers against the outside of his thigh, in a subtle attempt to rouse the other man’s attention, “It’s alright,” he says, finishing off his glass. “That just means the world can still surprise you.”

This time, he frowns instead of smiles. And Corvo is oddly hurt that he has crushed the elation that before permeated his every word. But perhaps, he was already slipping into melancholy.

“Show me your hand,” he asks, holding out his own so Corvo may offer his.

Corvo does so without hesitation, showing him the clean skin of his left hand. Delilah stole his Mark, those months ago. And the Outsider gave his gift to Emily instead.

“Do you wish,” he huffs, thumbing over the back of Corvo’s hand, watching as his fingers move against the knicks and cuts and scars, more permanent than his missing Mark. “I should have offered it again.” He laces his fingers in between Corvo’s.

His fingers are longer, thinner. Unblemished by age or work or broken bones. Pale and slender like the rest of him. Corvo curls his fingers down, locking their hands together. “You could not have known.”

“And yet I was meant to know everything,” he laughs again, his spirits evidentially returned. “Did you know that it was my name? Even I did not know.”

“How do you say it?” Corvo asks, curious what he should now call the not-a-god who stole into his private rooms, offering smiles and dizzying conversation. 

He shakes his head, “My tongue cannot make the sound. My brain cannot comprehend. It is lost to me now, though Daud whispered it in my ear. I knew it but for a moment. And now, I am no one again.”

Corvo tugs at his hand, drawing him off the edge of the desk to sprawl out across his lap instead. Legs folded clumsily over the armrest, his back supported by Corvo’s arm so he won’t tip over onto the floor. His hair falls into his eyes, brilliantly dark in the lamplight. 

“Why did you come to me?” Corvo asks, running his fingers through his hair, watching as the black strands fall back into place, seafoam eyes wide, alert. “To fill the air with your regrets? So I might swallow them down before they choke your lungs, hm?”

He tips his head just enough so that their mouths meet, pressing his lips firmly against Corvo’s, parted, slow. Perhaps he did see this much. The clever way they fit together. The patter of spring rain against the windows.

“So that I might breathe,” he whispers, still so close that Corvo can feel the heat behind each word. “I wagered that you would want me. And I believe I’ve won.”

“Mm,” Corvo thinks on it, “not much of a wager, if you know me as well as you should.”

“Ah,” he corrects, “true, Corvo, true. But you are fond of denying yourself. Your heart and head at odds. Perhaps I am just lucky tonight, that you are pliable.”

“You call it luck, but really, you are just very pretty.”

His skin flushes so dramatically at the simple praise that Corvo wishes to see if he goes red everywhere.

Corvo ghosts his fingers over his belt buckle, asking permission with soft taps against the nickel. Their position is an awkward one, with him still sprawled out across Corvo’s lap, the armrests of his chair largely keeping them both bracketed in. 

But he whispers, “Yes,” as Corvo’s hand drifts lower, palming the curve of his erection through the fabric of his trousers, feeling it harden under simple motions and slight attention. He lifts his hips to increase the pressure of Corvo’s gentle caress, breath catching between his teeth.

Corvo works the buckle open, then his fly, moving aside the layers that keep him covered to draw out his pretty cock. As long and slim as the rest of him, lovely and flush against Corvo’s hand. Another time, Corvo will put his mouth on it, suck him dry. But for the moment, he is content enough to take him in hand, stroke him smoothly as his face contorts, his mouth dropping open, however slightly, showing teeth too perfect to belong to a street urchin, skin too smooth. The Void has shaped him into something else. Stronger than he could have possibly been before. And Corvo wishes to take him apart. To learn the contours and flaws and imperfections that make him human once again. That make him the subject of Corvo’s fascination now. Because when he was called a god, Corvo had little interest, despite the loveliness of his face, the sureness of his smirk.

It is now, in his vulnerability, the way he might shatter to pieces in Corvo’s arms, a string of pleas as Corvo touches him, that Corvo desires in a way he believed he could no longer.

“Do you like it?” Corvo asks, watching the small, insignificant ways he moves. His hips, his tongue, his lashes. At even the slightest touch. Corvo loosens his grip, only barely stroking now. And the reaction is no less. The man in his arms going tight with want and need and yes.

“Yes,” he chokes. “Yes, Corvo, yes.”

He comes, white across the black fabric of his jacket, hiked up just enough to expose the flat of his stomach, the subtle jut of his hipbone. Corvo would like to taste there as well. When their positions are not so cramped. But for the moment, he drags his fingers through the mess across his jacket, as if testing it, making sure it’s real.

“I still can’t believe it’s possible,” Corvo admits. “That you are here. That you are real.”

“I have always been here, been real,” he corrects. “Only, before I was forced to be an entity ill suited for my talents.”

“Oh?” Corvo questions, “and what talents are those?”

He touches Corvo’s face, “I’m not sure yet, but it’s about time I learned.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for taking the time to read. Comments and kudos are always appreciated 
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](http://imperfectkreis.tumblr.com)


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